Brady v. Hopper (1984)
Question: Are mental health professionals liable for their patients’ behaviors when there are no foreseeable victims or actual threats of violence?
Holding: No; there was no duty on the part of a third person where the patient had made general threats to kill but no specific threats to identifiable victims. The opinion stated “the plaintiffs’ injuries were not foreseeable; therefore, the plaintiffs fall outside of the scope of the defendant’s duty.”
Hedlund vs. Superior Court of Orange County (1983)
Question: Does failure to warn an identifiable potential victim and those in close relationship to that victim constitute professional negligence?
Holding: Failure to warn an identifiable potential victim constitutes professional negligence. The court further held that the duty owed to such victims extended to “foreseeable” bystanders (in this case, the victim’s child).
Jablonski v. US (1983)
Question: Did psychiatrists fail to exercise due care in foreseeing a potential victim’s death and correspondingly breach their duty to warn?
Holding: The psychiatrists’ actions breached their duty to warn because a psychotherapist-patient relationship existed, the psychotherapist knew (or should have known) that Jablonski was dangerous, there was a foreseeable victim, and the necessary steps to discharge a duty to warn were not taken. The psychotherapist is bound by the duty to warn potential victims irrespective of their belief that this warning will be effective.
Lipari v. Sears Roebuck (1980)
Question: Does a therapist have a duty to take precautionary measures to protect potential victims of a patient who could pose a danger to others? What precautions are necessary? How specific must the threat be to enact such a duty?
Holding: This duty arises only when the therapist knows or should know that a patient presents an unreasonable risk of harm to others. Once this determination is made, the therapist must initiate whatever precautions are reasonably necessary (i.e., those precautions which would be taken by a reasonable therapist under similar circumstances) to protect potential victims of the patient. Sufficient precautions vary depending upon the individual characteristics of the case. The therapist is not liable for harm caused by the patient, but is liable only when his negligent treatment of the patient caused the harm. The key component is the foreseeability of the harm, and whether the therapist should have foreseen the danger. The victim does not have to be identifiable.
Tarasoff v. Regents of the University of California (1976)
Question: Do mental health professionals have a duty to warn third parties of potential violence?
Holding: Yes; the Court argued that “the protective privilege ends where the public peril begins.” They stated that once a therapist determines that a patient poses a serious threat to others, the therapist “bears a duty to exercise reasonable care to protect the foreseeable victim of that danger.”